1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to the conducting of electronic commerce, such as the purchasing of goods and/or services over the Internet. In particular, the invention relates to a system for convenient rapid entry of repeat orders for goods or services with minimal effort on the part of the user.
2. Background Art
In recent years, the volume of commerce transacted on the Internet has grown dramatically. Internet users enjoy the convenience of learning about products, comparison shopping, and placing orders for goods and services at any time of the day or night, from a personal computer all without leaving their home or office.
Due in good part to its speed, breadth and efficiency, Internet shopping has pervaded nearly every aspect of commerce. Consumers and businesses alike now conduct a vast array of commercial transactions electronically, including such things as requesting restaurant delivery service, booking travel reservations, and purchasing products such as groceries, electronics, books, household supplies, office supplies, furniture, kitchen equipment, and prescription drugs.
As more users incorporate electronic commerce activities into their daily lives and as more type of goods and services become available for purchase, it becomes highly desirable to maximize the convenience of conducting commercial activities via the Internet. The frequency with which an individual uses an Internet service tends to increase with the simplicity and convenience of using the service. This is particularly the case for consumable goods that must be ordered by a consumer on a periodic and ongoing basis. Therefore, it is highly desirable, and is an object of this invention, to provide a system for improving the speed and efficiency of conducting commercial transactions via the Internet.
One common prior art technique attempting to streamline the process of placing an order via the Internet is the use of customer accounts. The first time an individual places an order for goods and services from a particular vendor's Internet web site, the prospective customer is asked by the vendor to provide necessary personal information, such as name, address, telephone number, credit card number, etc. That information is then stored by the vendor for use should that customer return to the vendor's web site and place a future order. The customer is typically assigned a user name and password. Upon reentering the web site the customer, by entering his or her username and password during the placement of future orders, can place orders without undergoing the time consuming re-entry of the required personal information. However, for such future orders, the customer must still go through the effort of manually logging in to the vendor's Internet web site, and specifying the parameters of the order, such as selecting one by one each of the items sought to be ordered together with other specifics such as particular delivery service desired.
Another prior art technique, disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,960,411, is a “1-click” ordering technique by which a previously registered user can place an order for an item immediately by selecting that item on the vendor's web site. This technique seeks to improve the efficiency of placing an order via the Internet by allowing the user to circumvent the steps of placing each of items sought to be purchased in a virtual “shopping card”, checking out, selecting shipping options, and completing various other steps that may otherwise be required to complete and confirm an order. However the Internet electronic commerce system disclosed in the '411 patent, still requires that the user go through the effort of (1) first launching an Internet web browser software application, (2) logging into and entering the vendor's web site, (3) navigating the vendor's web site to locate the desired items or services to be ordered, and (4) tagging each the items desired, which are only then processed as an order.
As users increasingly turn to the Internet for their daily needs, many users find themselves repeatedly engaging in common transactions over the Internet. For example, a user may have a favorite pizza delivery restaurant, from which they regularly order a large pepperoni pizza and a bottle of soda for immediate delivery. Prior art systems of placing orders via the Internet require the user to enter all the details of such a desired order each time the order is placed. Some users may be dissatisfied, or even deterred from placing an order online, due to the ensuing inconvenience and effort of specifying and placing the order. Even under the “1-click” system, the user must specify the contents of each order each time the web site is visited, even if the same order is placed time and time again. By minimizing the effort required by a user to place an electronic order with a vendor, the likelihood of that user placing the order with the vendor is maximized. Therefore, it is an object of this invention to allow users to place repeat orders automatically, with minimal effort on the part of the user.
These and other objects of the invention will become apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art in view of the disclosure provided herein.